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Sunday, January 24, 2016

To-Do Lists: Get your tasks in order

The Key to Efficiency

Get your tasks in order, with James Manktelow and Amy Carlson.

Do you often feel overwhelmed by the amount of work you have to do,
or do you find yourself missing deadlines? Or do you sometimes just
forget to do something important, so that people have to chase you to
get work done?

All of these are symptoms of not keeping a proper "To-Do List." These
are prioritized lists of all the tasks that you need to carry out. They
list everything that you have to do, with the most important tasks at
the top of the list, and the least important tasks at the bottom.

By keeping such a list, you make sure that your tasks are written
down all in one place so you don't forget anything important. And by
prioritizing tasks, you plan the order in which you'll do them, so that
you can tell what needs your immediate attention, and what you can leave
until later.

To-Do Lists are essential if you're going to beat work overload. When you don't use them effectively, you'll appear unfocused and unreliable to the people around you. When you do
use them effectively, you'll be much better organized, and you'll be
much more reliable. You'll experience less stress, safe in the knowledge
that you haven't forgotten anything important. More than this, if you
prioritize intelligently, you'll focus your time and energy on high
value activities, which will mean that you're more productive, and more
valuable to your team.

Keeping a properly structured and thought-out list sounds simple
enough. But it can be surprising how many people fail to use them at
all, never mind use them effectively. In fact, it's often when people
start to use them effectively and sensibly that they make their first
personal productivity breakthroughs, and start making a success of their
careers.

Preparing a To-Do List

Step 1:

Write down all of the tasks that you need to complete. If they're
large tasks, break out the first action step, and write this down with
the larger task. (Ideally, tasks or action steps should take no longer
than 1-2 hours to complete.)

Note:

You may find it easier to compile several lists (covering personal,
study, and workplace, for example). Try different approaches and use the
best for your own situation.

Step 2:

Run through these tasks allocating priorities from A (very important, or very urgent) to F (unimportant, or not at all urgent).

If too many tasks have a high priority, run through the list again
and demote the less important ones. Once you have done this, rewrite the
list in priority order.

Using Your To-Do List

To use your list, simply work your way through it in order, dealing
with the A priority tasks first, then the Bs, then the Cs, and so on. As
you complete tasks, tick them off or strike them through.

What you put on your list and how you use it will depend on your
situation. For instance, if you're in a sales-type role, a good way to
motivate yourself is to keep your list relatively short, and aim to
complete it every day.

But in you're in an operational role, or if tasks are large or
dependent on too many other people, then it may be better to focus on a
longer-term list, and "chip away" at it day-by-day.
Many people find it helpful to spend, say, 10 minutes at the end of the day, organizing tasks on their list for the next day.

Tip:

Using Software

Although using a paper list is an easy way to get started,
software-based approaches can be more efficient in spite of the learning
curve. These can remind you of events or tasks that will soon be
overdue, they can also be synchronized with your phone or email, and
they can be shared with others on your team, if you're collaborating on a
project.

There are many time management software programs available. At a
simple level, you can use MSWord or MSExcel to manage your lists. Some
versions of Microsoft Outlook, and other email services such as Gmail, have task lists as standard features. Remember the Milk
is another popular online task management tool that will sync with your
smartphone, PDA, or email account. It can even show you where your
tasks are on a map. Other similar services include Todoist and Toodledo.

One of the biggest advantages to using a software-based approach to
manage your list is that you can update it easily. For example, instead
of scratching off tasks and rewriting the list every day, software
allows you to move and prioritize tasks quickly.

Tip:

All of us think, plan and work differently. A program that works well
for a colleague might not work well for you simply because you learn
and think in your own way. This is why it's useful to research and try
several different ways of compiling your list before deciding on a
single system.

Examples

To-Do Lists can help you get, and stay, on top of important projects and piles of tasks or decisions.

For instance, imagine you're heading a team that's working on a
project. There are so many tasks to do, and so many people doing them,
that staying on top of it all seems overwhelming.

In this situation, structure your list by team member, writing out
tasks and deadlines for every person on the project. Each day as you
write out your own tasks that need completion, you can also check your
Team To-Do List to see who's working on what, and if anything is due in
that day. You can also include other tasks that you need to complete as
part of your job.

Or, imagine you're in a sales role and have a long list of people who
you need to talk to. You write out a list of everyone you need to call
and every client you need to see, and start prioritizing.

You know that one client really keen on your product and is ready to
buy, so you prioritize them with an "A" – this is a prospect that's
really worth focusing on. Conversely, you know that another prospect is
playing you off against several competitors, meaning that the you'll
make less profit, and that there's a reasonable chance that you won't
get the business. You prioritize this person with a "D". It's worth
making some effort here, but you should focus most of your attention on
better prospects.

Tip:

To-Do Lists are particularly useful when you have a small number of
tasks that you need to complete. However, they can become cumbersome
when you have too many items on them, or when you need to progress
multiple projects. At this stage, it's worth starting to use Action Programs, which are designed to manage more complex situations reliably.

Key Points

To be well organized in the workplace, you need to be using To-Do Lists. By using them, you will ensure that:

You remember to carry out all necessary tasks.

You tackle the most important jobs first, and don't waste time on trivial tasks.

You don't get stressed by a large number of unimportant jobs.

Start by listing all of the tasks that you must carry out.

Mark the importance of the task next to it, with a priority from A
(very important) to F (unimportant). Redraft the list into this order of
importance. Then carry out the jobs at the top of the list first. These
are the most important, most beneficial tasks to complete.

You can also use software-based approaches to manage your list. You
can often access these from anywhere, and they can often be synced with
your Smartphone or PDA.

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My Blogs have been like a second hard drive to me.

My Blogs have been used as a second hard drive, in case of crashes in equipment. Google is a safe place to store information collected while surfing the WWW. If any content does not seem to adhere to Creative Commons Rules and you want it removed, please contact me to have it removed from the blog. Everything is true to the best of my knowledge.